Amazing women: Charlotte Church

Charlotte Church has spent her whole life in the limelight. From a child star singing for the President of the United States, to tabloid favourite with some pretty questionable pop videos along the way.

But now Charlotte Church has spoken out about how uncomfortable she felt about doing those videos; how she was manipulated by the industry into wearing revealing clothing. Most worrying of all, she says she still pays the price today, with vicious attacks on Twitter and a music industry who refuses to take her seriously.

We did receive some flack for this, mainly from a misunderstanding that we were attacking the women themselves. In fact we were trying to analyse and question industry that seems to be pushing women into this.

In her BBC 6 Music John Peel lecture, Charlotte Church echoes exactly our concerns, and confirms our suspicions that women are being cajoled into it. Church confesses that she felt deeply uncomfortable in the clothes she was encouraged to wear in her pop music videos.

Some argue that people like Rhianna are completely in control of their image. They know what they’re doing – they’re playing with their sexuality and using it to get what they want. However Church says that while this might be the case, if they do decide they no longer want to do this, they won’t be able to stop. The industry won’t let them. They may also find that it haunts them for the rest of their careers.

We believe it was pretty brave of Charlotte Church to stand up and say these things; to lift the curtain on the industry. She admitted she got it wrong, and that takes guts. What’s more she’s pushing to make it right again.